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This year I am remembering the six members of the BOXALL family recorded on the war memorial in the parish church at West Dean (near Chichester), Sussex.

Fortunately some biographical has survived for Frederick BOXALL, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website records that Frederick was in fact Frederick Henry BOXALL and that he was the “son of Arthur and Charlotte Boxall, of 84, The Warren, West Dean, Chichester, Sussex.”

According to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website Frederick Henry was just 19 years old when he died on the 12th August 1918, whilst serving with the 1/4th Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers (his regimental number was 75430).

His medal index card shows that he had previously served with the Royal Sussex Regiment (regimental number: 257336) and his entry in Soldiers Died in the Great War shows that he was a member of the training reserve (number: TR/5/53157), presumably training with the Royal Sussex Regiment and then being transferred to the Northumberland Fusiliers when he arrived overseas.

There is a discrepancy on his entry in Soldiers Died in the Great War, which gives his place of birth as Southwark, Middlesex. Whilst this is of course possible, I have found no evidence that Arthur and Charlotte BOXALL were ever away from Sussex and the area around West Dean.

Frederick Henry BOXALL was born on the 10 March 1899 and his birth was registered in the Westbourne Registration District (which contained the parish of West Dean). His baptism was at St. Andrew’s Church, West Dean on the 30th April 1899.